A single grain of sand

I've read comments and spoken to people about life / meaning / purpose and they say how insignificant we are. But a single human being is amazing, as is a single grain of sand, in fact even a single atom is so mind-blowingly amazing how can anyone dismiss it?

Yet they do, and that seems strange to me, yet when I mention this, everyone makes out that I'm the odd one. Ok I can understand why people don't like life, why it's a burden and even why people take their own lives. But why people can't pick up a single grain of sand, look at it, and go 'Wow, that's amazing' is beyond me.

 

As an individual anything can be amazing, but as a whole even something beautiful becomes dirty.

One grain of sand is amazing... but a handful of sand is just messy.... dirty.

 

What a strange night. I lay in bed thinking "If a living me here in bed is so amazing, then wouldn't a dead me lying here be equally amazing" and the answer was 'yes' but then I thought well what's the difference, in fact if I was simply replaced by a brick or a pile of sand what would be the difference?

So what makes one thing better than another? Well I guess I label things, such as 'useful', 'interesting' etc. but toothpaste is only useful when I need to clean my teeth, a book is only interesting when I'm reading it, a rose is only beautiful when I'm looking at it. Each of these things has their moments.

However with myself, I'm constantly monitoring myself. Thinking am I useful, interesting or attractive? And the answer is usually no. But then the answer is the same for the book, the rose and the toothpaste. There are just the occasional moments when these things take on more significance, and perhaps the same is true for me as well?

 

recently I've been starting to think about how all human life is based on stories, I feel we are truly a storytelling race. I think if all human life was lost, we would take all the significance away from things. I mean other beings will still be there to interact with the world, but if a person dies then no one sees the world the same way again. I don't know if this is a happy or sad thought. It bothers me to think that things have no value if we are not here, because of course we all prefer to think of our world view to be inherently true, it is sad to think that an object loses the beauty we saw in it when we day, but on the other hand it gives our perspective power and importance, so it can also be a happy thought. I hope I am not intruding on your personal train of thought, I just thought it was and interesting topic.

 

i know what you mean.

a lot of my counselling sessions involve me just saying, i love preparing my food, i love cooking, i love the simplicity in chopping up vegetables, making some mixture like a potion, then going to sleep. my counsellor knows what i mean, and encourages it, the whole act of going out and buying food, chopping it up- maybe even making something new than what i'm used to!

i feel a lot like you, ever since i've come out of hospital life is just amazing, it's amazing, there's so much out there but at times, i get too overwhelmed, too distracted on so many things to concentrate on one thing sometimes but when i do concentrate and get myself grounded, i get a great amount of pleasure out of doing simple things like cooking and sleeping, washing, the basics of what my body needs at times, nutritious food and lots of rest and taking care of myself and healing myself. i've always taken to counsellors who work with body and mind, you can't seperate them both physical things and mental/intangible things, and when you combine them and take care of yourself, concentrate on the details that people miss in those things because they do it in a haze, life is worth living, it's worth living...

 

no they can take on more meaning than just being for the obvious uses you say.

you could play with those objects and really study them and you'd find a lot more coming at you..

at the moment it isn't grains of sand that i've been drawn to it's the litter, discarded packages, for some reason i've been drawn to them for the last 2 years...i think it says a lot of how i feel myself, or something? . i don't know, but looking at my photos i tend to be drawn to litter and rubbish heaps since i was 17 :laugh:

 

Imagine in the beginning, seeing sand for the first time. There won’t even be a name for it. Pristine and golden, running through you’re hands. Truly paradise. How far we’ve come down.

 

Thanks for the responses folks, nearly all my threads turn into monologues so I appreciate it.

In a way I felt bad about posting it, because it feels so hypocritical. Your emotional side is telling you everything's shit but your rational side is trying to point out that things aren't that bad.

Life always seems to be a struggle between the two, someone dies, your emotional side is telling you it's the worst thing ever and your rational side just sits there saying "hey, it's no big deal, we all die"

I dunno, maybe that conflict is what you need to stop you from spiralling out of control, or maybe some people have found a middle-ground which simply eludes me? In the end, which voice do you listen to, which one is true? Well, whatever, at least you can't say life is dull.